Are you suffering from writer’s block? Have you run out of things to say? Have you already told us what you had for lunch?

Well I have the cure.

It’s simple really. All you need to do is get in your car and drive it directly in to a snow bank. There you go. Instant blog material. For example, my night.

The three younger kids and I were in the car on our way to pick up their teenage brothers. Keaton was at church and Justis was at a friend’s house. It was 7:45pm and I had to pick Keaton up at 8pm. We have an alley where our garage is. The city does not plow that alley (except this one time when some dipwad tried to plow in his S10 pickup truck and got stuck about halfway down blocking us all in, but that’s a whole other story). I don’t know if I’ve mentioned this enough this year, but we’ve had over 60 inches of snow and ice this winter. Therefore, there are grooves in the ice and snow where all of our cars have driven down the alley. It’s kind of like a roller coaster ride where your cart stays on the tracks and you bounce off those tracks. Good times.

A normal person with average intelligence would drive with their tires in those tracks. I, however, am not such a person. I like to think of myself as more of an Einstein. An entrepreneur. A risk taker you might say. I was tired of being tossed around on that stupid roller coaster ride that is our alley. So I decided to be a rebel and try to drive on top of the ice outside of the grooves.

About five houses down from my house, I slid off the ice, bumped in to the grooves, slammed on my breaks and when all was said and down I was sideways in the alley. SIDEWAYS. Front wheels dug deep in to the snow bank on the right. Rear wheels dug even deeper on the left. Roller coaster ride over.

I threw the car in to reverse and tried to back out. Yeah, like that was going to happen. The van got and evil grin on its face and laughed hysterically at me. I’m pretty sure I heard it should, “You are goin’ nowhere lady.”

I gave Skyler & Spencer the remote to the garage and told them to run up and get some shovels. They came back with three shovels and we tried to dig out the wheels. Have you ever tried to dig your car out of snow banks that are taller than your bumpers. It’s not fun.

After a while my fingers were numb, my nose was running, and the car still wouldn’t move. So I did what any self-respecting woman does. I called my husband.

Lee was in class. He did not answer the first time I called. He probably thought I wanted to know where the remote was or something (which is something he paged me 911 about when I was in school ten years ago). But when I called a second time he went in to the hall and answered. The conversation went something like this:

Lee: What do you need?
Me: Um, I got the car stuck in a snow bank.
Lee: Where are you at?
Me: In the alley about five houses down from ours.
Lee: What did you do? Where you trying to drive outside of the grooves. (He knows me so well.)
Me: Um…yes.
Lee: What do you need me to do?
Me: You need to go pick up Keaton and Justis and if I’m still stuck when you get home, help me.
Lee: You’ll still be stuck when I get there. I’m leaving now.

And he was right. I was still stuck when he got there. I hadn’t even moved an inch. I wasn’t oops-I’m-stuck-in-a-snow-bank-let-me-dig-out stuck. No I was wholly-f*ck-I’m-stuck-and-will-probably-have-to-call-a-tow-truck-or-else-cry-or-
maybe-both stuck. Maybe even broke-something-in-the-front-end-of-the-van stuck. I was stuck.

Lee and Keaton held back their laughter long enough to try and dig me out. Still not moving.

I finally sent all the kids home and to bed while dad and I tried to dig out.

When it was obvious the van was wedged tightly between those two snow banks and shoveling wasn’t doing a damn bit of good, Lee went to plan B. He hiked back up to the garage and got a come-along. [I say that like I have any clue what a come-along is, but really I just asked Lee what that thingy was called.] Lee has been driving this little Isuzu SUV thing he may or may not be buying from his friend (we aren’t really talking about it because he knows I don’t want to spend money on another car). He hooked one end of the come-along to the Isuzu and the other end to my van. Then he threw it in reverse and jerked my van.

It moved. It really moved. We could see progress.

But we were still stuck. And by we I really mean me.

It took several more jerks. Some shoveling. And then some more jerking. And then a miracle happened. One final jerk and I was no longer sideways. I was facing Lee. And it had only taken an hour and a half to get out of the snow. If my toes weren’t completely frozen I would have gotten up and did a little touch down dance.

Now my ABS light is on and who knows what else is wrong with my van. I can’t think about it right now. Right now I’m frozen like a popsicle. Right now I need to curl up in my favorite blanket, in front of the heater with a mug of hot cocoa. No more driving for me until Spring.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, February 27th, 2008 at 10:00 pm and is filed under A day in our life. Comments are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.